


all i need is your hand to drag me out again

by forgiveness_in_eurydice



Category: A Crown of Candy - Fandom, Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: ADHD, ADHD Jet Rocks, Animal Death, Autism, Autistic Theobald Gumbar, Autistic/ADHD Liam Wilhelmina, Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Gen, Grief, Post-Episode 6, but only bc i wrote it before e7, meltdowns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:20:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24295744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forgiveness_in_eurydice/pseuds/forgiveness_in_eurydice
Summary: Before, during, and after the battle.
Relationships: Liam Wilhelmina Jawbreaker & Jet Rocks, Liam Wilhelmina Jawbreaker & Jet Rocks & Theobald Gumbar, Liam Wilhelmina Jawbreaker & Theobald Gumbar
Comments: 9
Kudos: 50





	all i need is your hand to drag me out again

**Author's Note:**

> -Spoilers for episode 6  
> -Content warning for pretty vivid/drawn-out descriptions of autism meltdowns (it's something that's difficult for me to read, so I figure it may be for other people as well)  
> -Title from "The Loneliness and the Scream" by Frightened Rabbit (a song that somehow manages to fit all of Ally's characters perfectly)

Liam has thought, more than once, that one of the strangest things about living as a political prisoner is how it feels at once wildly different and uncomfortably similar to being at home. There are new rules here, rules he doesn’t understand. New things to do, new ways to behave, new unspoken guidelines to memorize. He gets bullied less, but he also gets ignored more. Everyone here seems to be in more of a hurry than they are back home. But he still has Preston. He still spends most of his time roaming among the trees. He still feels alone most of the time. Sometimes—deep in the forest, or half-asleep at night with Preston in his arms—he can almost convince himself that nothing’s changed. It’s a constant contradiction. Familiar and different. Lonely and crowded. Almost like home, but not quite.

It’s a bit like Liam himself, really. Contradictory. Paradoxical. Liam has been told multiple times, by multiple people, that he doesn’t really make sense. That they can’t quite figure him out. He feels, a lot of the time, like he lives in extremes. Too quiet or too loud, too much or too little. Shy and withdrawn and afraid of rejection, but also tactless and off-putting, never thinking before he speaks. He craves acceptance and companionship, but also desperately wishes to be left alone. Seventeen years of trying and failing to find middle ground have taught him that people never really know what to do with someone like him. Someone who doesn’t know how to exist in moderation, who talks about seeds too much and everything else too little, who always manages to say the exact wrong thing. Liam thinks people hate him a lot, but he knows in the back of his mind that, while sometimes it’s a genuine belief, sometimes it’s a conclusion he jumps to because it’s...easier. Easier to deal with the extreme of hatred than to admit that most people just don’t _get_ him. That most of them can’t be bothered to try and figure him out. Here, a couple people have tried, at least. Jet, mostly. Liam isn’t quite sure if Jet likes him, but when she tells him he’s cool, when they sneak away to watch Lapin and the Sugarplum Fairy together, he’s at least reasonably certain that she doesn’t hate him. But Jet is busy, and usually with Ruby, and so, still, Liam is alone. Mostly.

For the most part, Liam is...not _happy_ , but okay enough with continuing to live a half-familiar contradiction of an existence at Castle Candy. Even when the routine is disrupted by the announcement of the Grand Tournament and the trip to Comida, it still only feels a little different. Only a little wrong. The multiple attempts on Amethar’s life are the first signs that something is off. The first indications that this isn’t like life back home. But even then, Amethar, for all his flaws and insecurities and incompetence, is still the _king_. He’s so strong, so different from but also similar to Liam’s father that he still seems, somehow, sort of untouchable. Of course they would come after him, and of course he would make it through. If Liam doesn’t think about it too hard, Amethar’s repeated brushes with death could still slot into the category of not quite right but not quite wrong.

Liam doesn’t really want to admit that his arrest was the first moment that he realized his life had slipped into entirely new territory, that he was—and is—lost and confused and drowning. It seems selfish, to say that he didn’t realize how wrong things were until it was him being threatened instead of his cousin. But it’s not really about seeing it through his own eyes. It’s about the realization that if he—forgettable, overlooked, easier to ignore than to deal with—can be targeted, then no one is safe.

The church is too loud.

Liam has never done well with noise. It’s always too _much_ , crowding his mind and senses and making it impossible to think. It’s part of why he prefers to stay out in the forest, where sound can spread out, rather than inside, where there’s always too much noise and movement in too small of a space. 

Now, he doesn’t have a choice. He’s trapped, fighting for his life in a blur of sound and color and too much all at once. He doesn’t think. He sends Preston over to Lapin without a second thought, because there’s too much noise for him to consider it beforehand. The shouts and footsteps and the clanging of armor and blades echo endlessly off the stone walls, pounding against his head and hurting almost as much as the arrows piercing his skin. He’s not thinking, he can’t think, and he cries out when the glass shatters because it’s _too loud_ and it _hurts_. He’s too dazed to process what that shattering means until Jet is flinging her arms around him, shielding him from the fall to the ground. Even as badly hurt and shaken as he is, Liam processes, distantly, that Jet _did_ something for him. That someone cared enough to protect him. He feels a foggy, faraway rush of gratitude, and then—

And then, through the window, Keradin’s mace swings downward.

For as long as he can remember, Liam has had a tendency to occasionally... _overreact_ to certain things. Or at least, that’s what his family has always called it. It makes sense, he supposes. When you see someone burst into tears and scream and scratch at their skin because they’re frustrated or the room is too loud or too bright, it’s hard not to say that they’re overreacting. He’s never figured out how to tell his family—to tell anyone—that frustration and anger and loud noises collect into energy that wells up in his body, so intense and awful and overpowering that he feels like he’ll die if it doesn’t _go_ somewhere. So he cries, and sometimes he breaks things—nothing valuable, nothing that belongs to someone else—and he screams until his throat is raw because, as much of an overreaction as it might seem, it’s the only possible way he _can_ react. It doesn’t happen as often now as it did when he was younger. He’s heard “You’re embarrassing me, Liam” hissed through his father’s teeth enough times that he’s learned to control himself. He’s learned to shut down instead, or at least to just cry instead of fully breaking down. But there are still times, occasionally, when something inside of him snaps and he loses control, no matter where he is or who’s watching.

The realization that Preston is still inside the church is not one of those times.

The nauseating crunch of Keradin’s mace against Lapin’s body, and the soft, familiar squeal of a pig in distress—it calls for tears, and shouting, for a loud and desperate expression of grief. But instead, it’s cold, horrible numbness. Liam feels himself shaking, hears himself murmur, “Preston,” and his own voice sounds far away. He doesn’t realize that he’s moving forward, back towards the church, until he feels arms—Theobald’s, he realizes—around his waist, pulling him back.

“You can’t go back in there, kid,” Theo says, and his voice is so broken and Liam is so disoriented that he barely even recognizes it as Theo speaking.

“I—I have to,” Liam says, and it comes out in a whisper. He doesn’t say anything else, and he doesn’t struggle as Theobald leads him away. He doesn’t look back. He runs, with the rest of them, even as his bruised, bloodied legs threaten to give out. He only registers that he’s crying when he brushes his hair out of his eyes and realizes that his face is wet. No sobs, no screams, only silent tears staining his cheeks.

The screaming comes later.

They don’t rest during the remainder of the daylight, even with all of them as weak as they are. They have to move. They have to get somewhere they won’t be found for the night, and then they can sleep. They head towards the forest, and no one suggests trying to find someone who will take them in overnight. They all know that right now, it’s safer to brave the woods than to take their chances on strangers. Safer to spend the night among the trees, with none of the belongings they brought to Comida, than to risk going back for them.

When they reach the woods, Liam finds himself in the front of the group. He doesn’t like everyone walking behind him, doesn’t like that he can hear them but can’t see them. But this is what he does best, so he navigates until the pain and exhaustion is so bad that he feels like he can’t go on any longer, and then he goes on a little longer, until they come to a small clearing. Big enough that they can sleep there relatively comfortably, but secluded enough that there’s little chance of anyone finding them.

No one says much as they assemble makeshift beds out of leaves and grass and their own coats. Theobald, the least injured out of the five out of them, takes it upon himself to build a fire, waving away offers of help with none of his usual affectionate exasperation. Jet and Ruby huddle together—not for warmth. It’s not all that cold out, and with the fire it’s plenty warm. They huddle together, and Liam knows why, even if he can’t put it into words. Amethar stares into the fire, and there are tears in his eyes, glinting in the warm yellow light. 

And through it all, Liam is numb. He stands slightly away from everyone, staring at the trees without seeing them, until Theo places a hand on his shoulder and gently guides him over to the fire. It glows warm against his skin, and still he’s cold, silent, sitting just outside of his own body. He’s not grieving. He’s not even thinking. Not until he reaches down, absently, distantly, to pet Preston. His hand falls through empty air, brushing against the ground, and the grass feels like jagged stone against his fingers. His surroundings, distant and blurry, suddenly snap into sharp focus, and the absence of Preston next to him is like a knife to the throat. Suddenly, he is no longer numb. He can feel the entire nightmarish day collecting under his skin, in his lungs, like the same familiar buildup of frustration but so, so much worse.

“Liam?” Ruby says, and Liam realizes that she’s looking at him, and that he’s crying, and that a scream is trapped in his throat and it hurts worse than any of the physical wounds he’s collected today. Ruby reaches out, tries to grab his hand, and he snatches his arm away, too close to his boiling point to dwell on the hurt and confusion in her eyes. He stands, abruptly, and a twig breaks under his feet, and right now even that small sound is too fucking _loud_ , and it’s all it takes for Liam to break too. His head swims, and his entire body pulses with horrible grief-stricken energy, and he closes his eyes and screams. He screams because Preston is gone, and Lapin is gone, and because Lapin hated him and because of a broken twig and because it’s all he can do. Distantly, he hears concerned voices, and he can’t tell if they’re asking him if he’s all right or telling him to shut up or both. He opens his eyes, briefly, his vision blurred with tears. They’re all looking at him, and it reminds him too much of the tournament, of everyone staring at him, that overwhelming certainty that they all hate him. It’s too much, it’s too painful, and he turns and stumbles away into the trees.

He doesn’t go too far. Not far enough to be fully separated from the group. Just far enough so he knows they can’t see him. He collapses next to a tree, and the sudden movement causes his hat to fall off and land on the ground next to him. Liam looks at it, and his hat falling off feels, suddenly, like the worst thing that could possibly happen to him. He grabs the hat and screams into it, his entire body heaving with sobs. He bites down on the fabric, hard, and he doesn’t let go until his teeth ache and that awful white-hot energy seems to slowly fade out of his body and into the red fabric balled up in his hands. He lets the hat fall back to the ground, and he hugs his knees to his chest and cries.

Liam doesn’t know how long it takes for him to stop crying. Half an hour at least, he’s sure. Even when he does stop, he doesn’t really. He’s no longer sobbing, but when he remembers the way he broke down in front of everyone, the way they were all staring at him, it’s easy for tears to spill down his cheeks again. The aftermath of these episodes is always just as bad as the actual loss of control. It’s always regret and remorse and overwhelming shame. He sits with his back against the tree and tries not to think about Annabelle Cheddar telling him there’s something wrong with him, about Amethar saying _she’s right_ with zero hesitation, about the fact that he knows it’s true but he doesn’t know _why_. He doesn’t know why he reacts to things the way he does, why he doesn’t understand the unspoken rules that everyone else seems to know, why he’s so impulsive and off-putting and _wrong_. 

There’s some vindication in knowing that this time, for once, he wasn’t freaking out over something insignificant. He hears his father’s voice in his head— _you’re embarrassing me_ —and he knows that at least this time he wasn’t embarrassing his family for no reason. He has a reason. He’s grieving.

But who is he grieving for, anyway? A pig. A pig and a man who hated him. He knows, somewhere in the back of his mind, that it’s absurd to deny himself the right to mourn, that no one here would look down on him for crying for a pig who was his best friend. But the sudden need to punish himself outweighs logic, and he begins to cry again, once again drowning in shame and grief and the knowledge that not only was Preston his best friend, he was his _only_ friend, and now he’s gone and Liam has no one.

When Liam hears footsteps behind him, he doesn’t turn around right away. Partly because he knows it could mean danger—it’s unlikely that they’ve been found out here by anyone who wants to harm them, but it’s not impossible. But he also knows that it could be someone coming to check on him, even if he can’t imagine why anyone would want to. He takes a breath, sits up a little straighter, and turns to look. Seeing Theobald standing behind him isn’t particularly surprising. Seeing Jet with him is...not surprising either, exactly, but also not what he expected. Theo, he assumes, has come to tell him to go to sleep. Jet...he’s not sure why Jet is here. She’s nice to Liam, is one of the people he spends the least time thinking hates him. But she’s also energetic and easily distracted and always on the move, never stopping to pay close attention to much of anything. Liam is always a little confused when she and Ruby make any kind of time for him. He doesn’t understand why they would want to include him in anything, and he doesn’t understand why Jet went out of her way to come over here now, when she should be sleeping. He tries to smile at her and Theo, and he’s pretty sure it doesn’t work.

“Hey,” Jet says softly. Her face is half-moonlit, half-shadowed, and she looks...small. Younger than usual. Next to her, Theo stands mostly in shadow. He’s not wearing his armor, which seems wrong somehow, but his sword is in his hand. It seems so natural there that Liam wonders if he even notices that he’s carrying it.

“Hey,” Liam says, and his voice is slightly hoarse. “What, um…” He wants to ask what they’re doing here, if they’re okay, if they’re mad at him, but the words die in his throat. It’s hard, a lot of the time, to make himself talk when he’s upset.

“Is it okay if we sit with you for a minute?” Theo asks. His voice sounds less broken than it did earlier, but still weary and almost––but not quite––despairing. Liam hesitates, unsure of why Theo wants to sit with him rather than making him come back to the clearing and go to bed. Then he nods, without quite knowing why. 

They make their way over to him, Theo sitting on his left side and Jet on his right. They sit close to him, but not too close. Not close enough that either of them could accidentally touch him. It feels like an act of kindness that he’s not sure he deserves. The three of them sit in silence for a moment, listening to the wind rustling softly through the trees. Then Liam says, softly and without really meaning to, “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” Jet asks. It feels like a test, even if Liam knows it’s not her intention. He swallows hard and says, “For being...embarrassing.”

“You’re not embarrassing. And you don’t have to apologize,” Theo says. He isn’t looking at Liam, but he sounds... _earnest_. Liam isn’t great at telling when people do or don’t mean what they say, but Theo’s tone gives him no reason to think that he’s lying, and it makes him want to cry all over again.

“He’s right,” Jet says after a moment, and she turns her head to look at Liam. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You’re grieving.”

“So is everyone else,” Liam says, trying and failing to hold her gaze.

“Yeah. Not in the same way, though,” Jet says softly, a little sadly, and Liam feels tears pricking his eyes again.

“He was my only friend,” he admits in a half-whisper. “No one else...I mean...Lapin hated me, and––”

“No he didn’t, kid,” Theo says, and now he turns to look at Liam too. He looks so tired, and like he might have been crying. “And we don’t either.”

“Yeah,” Jet says. “I like you. I like hanging out with you.”

“Are...are you sure it’s not just because we’re related?” Liam asks, not wanting to fight her on it but not quite ready to accept what she says as true. “I mean, you kind of have to like me, right?”

“No I don’t,” Jet says, and Liam almost laughs because her answer is so blunt, and so _Jet_. “You’re my second cousin who I didn’t know for the first seventeen years of my damn life. I’m supposed to be _nice_ to you, but I’m under no obligation to _like_ you. But I do.”

“Oh,” Liam says. “I...I like you too.” The words feel awkward in his mouth, but Jet smiles, and she still looks small and tired but her smile seems genuine. Hesitantly, he turns to face Theo and says, “You too.” Theo smiles, just like Jet did. “I like you too, Liam,” he says. Liam smiles, and it feels real, or almost real. He looks at Theo, and at Jet. They’re so different, even if they want so many of the same things. He sees himself in both of them. He worries, sometimes, that he’s the worst of them. All of Theo’s rigidity and stubbornness with none of his bravery and steadfastness. All of Jet’s impulsivity and recklessness with none of her boldness and charisma. It hurts to think about, and he hopes it’s not true.

Abruptly, Jet turns to Liam and asks, “Can I give you a hug?” and again, he nearly laughs because it’s both exactly and not at all what he expected. “I kind of need a hug, I think,” she continues. “But only if you’re okay with it.” Liam nods, and Jet wraps her arms around him. She’s warmer than Preston, and it doesn’t bring the same kind of safety that holding Preston did, but it’s comforting. It’s nice to be close to someone. Over Liam’s shoulder, Jet says, “What about you, Theo? Is it weird for me to hug you?” Behind him, Liam can hear Theo chuckle softly and say, “No, it’s not weird.” Jet lets go of Liam and clambers over to Theo, who puts one arm around her and, after a nod of permission, his other arm around Liam, squeezing both of them gently to his sides. Liam closes his eyes and takes maybe the first deep breath he’s taken all day.

It’s not long before Theo is standing up, telling Liam and Jet they should get some sleep, and ushering them back to the clearing, where Amethar and Ruby are sleeping next to the fire. As they walk back, Liam tells Jet, “Um, thank you. For...for asking before you hugged me.”

“Of course,” Jet tells him with a small smile. Next to her, Theo says, quietly, “I appreciate you asking too. I don’t like being touched without permission either.”

“You don’t?” Liam says, looking up at him, and Theo smiles. “I think we’re alike in a lot of ways, Liam,” he says. “I just have more experience hiding things, that’s all.” Jet, for once, doesn’t say anything. Liam wonders, vaguely, if she’s good at hiding things too.

Back at their makeshift campsite, Theo stays up to keep watch, saying he’ll wake up Amethar in a while. He sits on the grass and lets Liam and Jet lay their heads in his lap, and it’s so kind that Liam almost starts crying again. Up above, the moon is half-obscured by clouds, and Liam is not okay. He doesn’t know when he’ll be okay again, but right now, next to the fire, it feels just a little easier to bear. He falls asleep with tear tracks on his cheeks and the fire crackling gently in his ears.

**Author's Note:**

> This was written almost entirely before episode 7 and published right after it came out (before I watched any of it), so if my descriptions of what happened immediately post-e6 contradict canon, that's why!


End file.
